[A/N: It was the bunnies! I swear! I didn't mean to start anything else, but they tied me to my chair and forced me to type this! Really! But I hope you like it anyway!]
Prologue:
Itachi stared absently at the swift-flowing water of the river before tossing a small rock in. There was barely any splash as it sank into the water.
"Something on your mind, Itachi?" Shisui asked quietly.
Itachi shrugged but didn't answer. His troubles were nothing he could tell Shisui about, anyway.
Shisui had been such a faithful friend, even if the two of them had always been on separate paths: Shisui's for the clan, Itachi's for the village. It was the least Itachi could do to get it over with now and spare his cousin what would come later on.
Itachi threw another rock into the water for the sake of delaying the inevitable.
"Itachi..."
"I'm fine, Shisui," Itachi lied. "Really I am."
"Itachi, I'm sorry," Shisui said, gently putting his hand on Itachi's arm.
Itachi turned to look at him in confusion. He should be the one apologizing, but Shisui would never get to hear it—
The senbon whipped past his face almost too quickly for Itachi to realize that it had cut him. Shisui hadn't thrown it, Shisui was still right next to him, but his grip had transferred firmly to Itachi's wrist so that he couldn't dodge the next two senbon that struck him in the shoulder. Itachi's vision was already blurring by the time those struck; whatever drug or poison was being used worked very fast.
And so now it's all come to nothing, he thought before everything went black.
...
Fugaku sighed as he looked down at the unconscious body of his eldest son. Itachi didn't look like a formidable ANBU agent as he lay on the tatami floor with his dark hair spilling out around him. He looked small and vulnerable and the worst thing about it was that in his current state he was.
"He is a traitor!" one of the elders was saying. "We must get rid of him before he can pose any further threat to us!"
Sadly, Fugaku had to agree to both statements. While he could hardly believe that his own son had become so completely Konoha's thrall that he would kill his own family just to settle matters between the Uchiha and the village, he couldn't deny the evidence that had been found about Itachi's mission.
"Very well," he agreed with a heavy heart. "But I have a better idea than just killing him."
He could at least offer his child this slight protection.
It took hours to prepare the seals, and by the time it was was almost complete it was dangerously close to the time Sasuke would arrive home from the Academy. While Fugaku knew that Sasuke would never be able to find his way to the secret Uchiha council chambers, he still needed time to think of a way to explain Itachi's disappearance.
As the last symbol was drawn, Fugaku gently pulled Itachi's Konoha headband off before carrying him over to the circle, stepping carefully to avoid any of the calligraphy. "You may begin," he said, setting Itachi down in the center of the circle. The boy didn't move at all, and Fugaku began to worry that something was really wrong with him before remembering that the drug wasn't supposed to wear off for more than twelve hours.
Fugaku didn't participate in the actual jutsu, claiming it was because he wanted to say he had nothing to do with Itachi vanishing without actually having to quite lie, but actually because he didn't want to help do this to his son.
It took a surprisingly short time: the gathered elders began to push their chakra into the seal, and white light began to fill the symbols. As the light reached Itachi's body, it wrapped slowly around him until Fugaku could no longer look for fear of being blinded. Then there was a bright flash and everything went back to the way it had been before except that Itachi was no longer there.
...
The boy opened his eyes slowly. His head ached horribly and he had the strangest notion that there was something important he needed to do. When he tried to sit up, he found that he didn't have the strength, so he lay where he was looking up at the sky. It was a brilliant blue with lots of fluffy clouds in it, just like the sky ought to have, but something seemed off.
His head still hurt, and he closed his eyes again hoping that would relieve the pain. He must have passed out again, because when he opened his eyes he could hear footsteps and voices approaching.
"Natsuko-nee-chan, how much further is it to the train station?" said one voice. It sounded like a small child.
"Just a couple minutes further...Eriko-chan, come back here!" the other voice said as pattering little footsteps approached where the boy lay. "You don't want to get dirty on your first day in a new school, do you?"
"But nee-chan, there's a boy by the road! Why's he by the road?"
"What?" The heavier footsteps of the older girl approached, and she set another child down as she stopped. "Oh goodness...Eriko-chan, Aimi-chan, you stay right there, understand?"
The boy opened his eyes again to see a brown-haired girl leaning over him, biting her lip in worry. "Are you okay?" she asked quickly as she saw he was awake. "Look, maybe you'd better not sit up," she said, although she slipped a supportive arm around his shoulders all the same. "Can I do anything for you? Can I call your parents? What's your name?"
The boy started to reply, then frowned in concentration. "I don't know," he whispered, suddenly panicky. "I don't remember—I don't remember anything."
[A/N: Nooooo I have started another Itachi AU! Whatever shall l do?]